an overview of contrastive linguistics

An overview of Contrastive Linguistics Course 2015 Instructor: Le Nguyen Nhu Anh approaches to study languages General linguistics:  Language as a phenomenon of mankind  Sources of research: ALL languages  Objects of study What is unique in languages? What is universal?  Construct languages concepts => study specific approaches to study languages Descriptive linguistics:  Language as belonging of a specific community  Sources of research: specific language  Objects of study: nature of specific language approaches to study languages Comparative linguistics:  Languages of diff speech communities compared with each other  branches: Comparative Typological Historical Linguistics Linguistics Contrastive Linguistics Comparative Historical Linguistics  Very influential during 19th century  Diachronic approach  Major concerns:  reconstruct the pre-history of languages and determine their relatedness, grouping them into language families  describe and explain observed changes in particular languages  develop general theories about how and why language changes Vietnamese: Austroasiatic language family Mon-Khmer (147 languages) Aslian 19 languages Malay peninsula Cambodia, Laos, Eastern Mon-Khmer 67 languages Vietnam Monic languages Nicobar languages Northern Mon-Khmer 38 languages Palyu language Viet-Muong 10 languages (including Vietnamese) Unclassified North Munda South Munda languages Munda (21 languages) 12 languages languages Myanmar, Thailand Nicobar Islands, parts of India India, Myanmar, Laos, Southern China, Thailand Southern China Vietnam and Laos China India India Typological Linguistics  Major concerns: – Categorize all languages into typologies basing on similarities in lg structure – Compare languages of the same typology (not necessarily the same language family) Contrastive Linguistics  Major concern: compare any two or more languages to identify similarities & differences (Language typology & family not counted)  Selected languages for study depends on researchers’ practical & theoretical needs Contrastive vs Typological Contrastive vs Typological: Connection  Contrastive Linguistics: provide linguistic data for Typological Linguistics  Typological Linguistics: foundation for analyzing similarities & differences in Contrastive Linguistics Contrastive vs Comparative Historical  Contrastive: synchronic approach  Comparative Historical: diachronic approach [...].. .Contrastive vs Comparative Historical  Contrastive: synchronic approach  Comparative Historical: diachronic approach